Quick facts: DPDiscuss vs. DPRevived

Currently there are two major contenders for succeeding DPReview forums:

1. DPDiscuss
   Domain name: DPDiscuss.com (also registered DPRForums.com but redirecting to DPDiscuss)
   Founders: "Booted Cat" (meaning Puss in Boots) from DPR's Nikon Coolpix Talk forum, supported by friends from the same forum
   Based on: 77 Facebook groups (76 of them corresponding to the 76 DPReview forums, plus a "DPDiscuss Announcements" group)
   Users so far: Approximately 200+
   Image size supported: Images added directly to a post will automatically be downsized to a Facebook-defined size, but you can also attach a "File" (up to 100MB each) to a post which can be an original-size JPEG photo or even a RAW file.
   Text/video chat support: A text chatroom named "General chat" has been created for each group. A video chatroom (called "Room" on Facebook) can be created with a single click by a group admin.
   Moderators: Early group members and former DPReview moderators will be offered moderator roles.
   Financial and technical support: All features above are provided free by Facebook, an American tech giant with tremendous resources (read: money). DPDiscuss.com as a menu for you to navigate from group to group is created and hosted at Google Sites, a free service provided by another American tech giant, Google. All that Booted Cat has to pay is a domain registration/renewal fee for DPDiscuss.com yearly.
   More features: More features are to be discovered on Facebook, a modern, feature-rich and globally popular social platform.

2. DPRevived
   Domain name: DPRevived.com
   Founders: Some DPReview forum moderators
   Based on: A custom-made forum system built from scratch also including 76 sub-forums.
   Users so far: 1300+ claimed
   Image size supported: You can upload an image up to 4MB and then manually embed the image URL in your post. Any image larger than 4MB has to be uploaded elsewhere on the Web and the image URL manually embedded into your post.
   Text/video chat support: None.
   Moderators: Unknown, probably the founders.
   Financial and technical support: The forum system is built from scratch by the team and all operating costs including image hosting costs are paid by the team, whose financial sponsors are unknown.
   More features: The forum system is being built from scratch, light years behind platforms provided by tech giants such as Facebook and Google.

Facebook as a platform for forums ? good grass you are smoking over there

you copied and pasted this from DPR and i made a comment as when was Bob moderator ?
Don

"Fact:
Founders: Some DPReview forum moderators
Moderators: Unknown, probably the founders."
LOL
Please delete your raving.

i think the opposition is in panic mode, they backed the wrong horse and paying for it. Talk about a spam post ,these guys must think we are idiots not knowing the real facts.

Frankly, I have nothing against the existence of your FB - based discussion setup, but this kind of thinly veiled advertising makes me less interested to ever try it out, not more.

I dont get this "forums war" trying to succed DPR. DPR is WAY more than just forums, is like a mall to find everything from news, articles, reviews etc in one place.

Fredmiranda, rangefinderforum and l-cameraforum have been around for 20+ years and they are not fighting too ser which one will prevail.

A big nope from me. I’m already in a well established FB group for my camera brand, that’s not what I’m looking for post DPR. It’s the mix of all the different flavours of photography (and a proper forum structure) that has value.

Sorry, you don't get it.

0) I'm out of Facebook. I'd got out 2 years ago as the majority of sentient citizens. I don't intend to return.

1) There is no: "two contenders" in forums,"
because what you proposed is not a searchable forum, just an open-air recreation square.

2) A "big" is not better just worse.
Just in case you didn't "Read The Instruction" >>>>> because they care the less about communities.
You have right now in front of your nose what happened to DPR by Amazon and you've learned nothing.

3) I'm pretty sure you missed completely the point here: " light years behind platforms provided by tech giants".
The giants don't change nuthin...
.... and will never do it.
FB is the same as it was 15 years ago. They added automatic moderation that bans you if you write "I shoot you asap as I see you" in a shooting game group :-D ... for "violence and hate".

I suppose you are quite fond of what you did. My compliments to you for the effort.

But please refrain from spamming misinformation on how in the Net world reality works!

Happy life to you, but please stay away from me.

Thanks

Alain

Wow. This forum has only existed for a few days and already it's descended into bitchyness and willy waving.

Good luck to all who are trying to create a useful forum for photographers whatever platform it exists on.

To be fair, most of the discussion I've seen here during the short time has been pretty relaxed. It seems to me that it's more about a couple of pretty specific topics that get a bit hot and otherwise there's very little "bitchyness and willy waving.".

I have conscientiously avoided Facebook since I became aware of its existence. I avoid all social media. The closest I come are a small, few forums like DPReview that I can participate with a browser like Chrome. I notice my wife lost for hours in "cat videos" and unsubscribed input form everywhere. I won't be participating in a forum that requires Facebook, thank you.

I have enjoyed, and in fact come to rely on, DPReview for many years. It became as dependable as my daily morning coffee. My mind is open to the new DPRevived forum, but I wait and see what the critical mass becomes, what the content contribution looks like, what the look and feel and presentation evolves to. The DPReview was comfortable to me. The DPRevived still has a lot of rough edges. Hopefully I am not too old a dog to learn the ropes of this new forum.

It may be the case that no one forum can adequately replace DPReveiew, and that's ok. It doesn't need to be a competition - it just needs to be civil.

I would contribute a small monthly fee if the content and participation was good.

Peter

If your plan for building community is 2137 Facebook groups, your plan is building 2137 fragmented communities among the sea of other communities for Facebook to engage people ti serve ads for.

Facebook recently started updating their UI to encourage users more to scroll and less to comment, because they want people to spend less time discussing things and more time scrolling to see stories and ads inbetween.

Facebook is ads platform first and everything community second. If their algos find competing cameras community has more engagement than „your” community, it will funnel your users away from your community into other one. Because if you dont pay for the site you are the product the site sells to others.

Facebook doesn’t care about you being member of your community, it cares about you being active member of any community and watching ads.

But good luck with your „light years ahead platform provider by tech giant” anyway 😘

I don’t have a Facebook account. I’ve never had a Facebook account. And, I want nothing to do with Facebook going forward.

Maybe we don't like being lied to.

Hi Bob,

It takes some time for the DPReview mod to approve my reply. Here's my initial reply to you on DPReview:

I'm online now, but reading some news :-)

I appreciate your frankness, and will reply to you soon.

Some quick info:

I want to use free resources backed by big companies (so that they're not easy to fall; DPR/Amazon did keep the DPR forums up for nearly 25 years, if you look on the bright side) to build a successor to DPR forums at almost no cost to me. There are two options: Facebook groups and Google groups. What's wrong with Google groups is that they only allow you to attach an up to 10MB image to your post, and when you actually send the post, they further restrict the whole post's data size to an even smaller limit: you can actually only make a post with an image up to 6MB. Many DPR users are used to post original-size JPEGs exported from RAW files, usually 10+ MB in size. So Google groups are currently a no go for me. Facebook groups, on the other hand, you already know, allow you to attach an image of any size but will automatically downsize it to a Facebook-defined size, and it also allows you to attach a File up to 100MB which can be an original-size photo or RAW file. The biggest technical advantage of DPR forums is they allow you to add original-size shots in your post, which is essential for photographers to discuss and enjoy IQ.

Obviously, a Google group is more like a traditional forum / message board, but the image size issue above takes priority, so I chose Facebook groups as my solution.

sherman mentioned that Facebook groups are not searchable. Wrong. There is a magnifier icon on the upper right of a Facebook group's main interface for you to search with that group. If the group is a public group, all posts in it will also be indexed by Google. Further reading: smallbusiness.chron.com/facebook-groups-searchable-google-63661.html

I will come up with more answers, but the reasons above is why I chose Facebook groups.

Again, I like Bob's frankness and will write more later.

p.s. My biggest question for Bob: Why don't you start from an existing forum software system such as phpBB?